


I’ve only just met an old, old friend

by Violsva



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - 2000s, Alternate Universe - No Powers, American Politics, Bisexual Characters, Disabled Characters, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Protester Steve Rogers, Recovery, War Veteran Bucky Barnes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-22
Updated: 2018-04-22
Packaged: 2019-04-26 01:39:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14391489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Violsva/pseuds/Violsva
Summary: On March 27th, 2003, Steve Rogers was arrested in front of the Rockefeller Center, holding a sign saying NO BUSINESS AS USUAL.On March 4th, 2004, James Barnes lost most of his left arm to shrapnel from an IED in Baghdad.





	I’ve only just met an old, old friend

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings for references to past bad experiences with psychotherapy, and the Iraq War.

**June**

Steve should have expected it eventually. Actually, he had expected it, but he’d expected it right after Bucky moved in with him in April, and when it hadn’t happened then he’d forgotten about it. So it was a surprise when Bucky focused on him as he came in and then said, “For God’s sake, Steve, you could have just asked me to do the laundry.”

“I’m fine,” Steve gasped, and then he put down the basket and fumbled in his pocket. Bucky didn’t even have to say anything; he just raised his eyebrows as Steve got out his inhaler. Taking a dose didn’t give Steve enough time to think up a retort.

“Do you _want_ to do the laundry?” he asked finally, once he could breathe again. He tried really hard not to look at Bucky’s left arm.

“Looks like I’d better,” Bucky said.

“Great,” said Steve, trying to breathe slowly and let his lungs calm down. “Awesome.”

*

On Thursday Steve went right from the front door to his computer and picked up the tablet stylus. He’d forgotten to take his sketchbook that morning, but that woman on the subway...

Two hours later someone tapped his shoulder, and he jumped.

“You planning on having dinner, Steve?” Bucky asked.

“Oh, uh, right.” Steve blinked at the monitor, and then saved. He considered dinner plans as he followed Bucky to the kitchen, and then stopped. “You made dinner.”

“Don’t sound so surprised.”

“Thanks,” said Steve. Bucky had gotten out bowls; Steve ladled out soup and handed one to Bucky on his way to the tiny table. Steve still wasn’t entirely sure what he could and couldn’t do with the split hook, and probably Bucky would learn how to use it more too.

“How was work?” asked Bucky.

“Art work or work work?” asked Steve.

“Either.”

Steve bit his lip; Bucky’s gaze was starting to get unfocused again. “I forgot my sketchbook this morning,” he said. “But there was this woman on the subway home with amazing hair, and this necklace—”

Steve gestured descriptively. Bucky grinned. “You noticing women now?”

Steve blushed. “Not like that,” he said. Then he realized that he hadn’t ever really talked to Bucky about the thing with Peggy, and opened his mouth.

“And work work?” Bucky asked. He looked like he was actually paying attention; Steve had better keep talking.

“They want me to go to Boston for the convention next month,” he said. “I might, but I wouldn’t be doing anything except organizing backstage. Um. I just filled a lot of envelopes today, basically, but the gossip is that Bush’s lead’s gone in a couple of polls. I hope, anyway. Convention might help. What’d you do?”

Bucky shrugged. “Nothing much.”

“Did you get outside?” Steve asked, trying not to sound like he was nagging.

“Yeah.”

“And you made soup,” said Steve, gesturing with his spoon. “Good soup.”

“Sure.”

“Did you meet anyone?”

Bucky shrugged again. “There was a guy running at the park.”

That was actually the best answer to that question Steve had gotten yet. “You talk to him?”

“Not really.”

And that was a lot better than “no.” “Maybe he’ll be there again tomorrow.”

“Mmm.”

They finished eating quietly. Steve took his bowl and spoon to the sink afterwards and ran water into them, but he didn’t want to wash the dishes now, not when his head was playing with form and layout and texture.

“I want to get back to—” he said, already on his way out of the kitchen.

“Wear your wrist brace,” said Bucky. Steve grinned.

“Yeah, okay.” Bucky was having a pretty good day, he thought.

 

**July**

Bucky’s running friend—acquaintance, whatever—turned out to work at the VA, and got him into a therapy group. It was a weird coincidence, Steve thought, but maybe it explained why the guy was willing to strike up conversation with random grim-looking amputees.

Steve was not actually expecting Bucky to go, no matter how much he encouraged him, but he did, and when Steve wasn’t on deadline or meeting with a client sometimes he walked over with him.

“So you’re Steve,” Sam said, the first time they met. “I’m impressed.”

“Impressed?” Steve asked. “Not used to that one.”

Sam grinned. “You’re keeping that guy in line,” he said, nodding at the room Bucky had just gone into. Steve had been surprised by their casual trash-talking of each other; when Bucky mentioned that Sam was a therapist Steve had kind of assumed that he would be calming and empathetic. And maybe he would be with someone else, but not with Bucky. “That’s impressive.”

“It’s not a hardship,” Steve said awkwardly.

“Nah, I can see that,” said Sam. “I just finished my last session for the day. Coffee?”

“Yeah, sure,” said Steve. If Sam wanted to be friends with both of them, Steve was all for it.

“Staff room coffee okay, or do you want to go to the Starbucks up the street? That’s all that’s nearby.”

“Staff room coffee is fine.” Kind of a relief, too—Steve was doing okay, but he didn’t have a lot of cash to spare.

But in the staff room he wasn’t as sure. The last few months, and especially here, in the VA, had made him uncomfortable, in a way he couldn’t really talk about with Bucky. He’d thought it was fine when Bucky was overseas—Bucky was in the war, and obviously miserable even if he didn’t talk about it, and Steve was against the war and absolutely ready to start a fight with anyone who thought that meant he was against the military too. But now that Bucky was back he felt weirdly like he was in high school again, back when he’d been full of ideals and hoping to join the Army and knowing they wouldn’t take him, while next to someone who actually knew what it was like. He didn’t talk much to Bucky about it, and suddenly he didn’t know what to say to other vets.

But he didn’t have to talk about that now, he thought, as Sam pulled milk out of the fridge. He could just make small talk.

It didn’t end up being very small, but it couldn’t, really, when he was just here because of his best friend’s PTSD.

“I honestly wasn’t expecting him to come at all,” said Steve. “I mean, no offence, but he’s got issues with psychiatrists. I guess that’s what it is, anyway—he never listens when I tell him he should have one.”

“Some people find group therapy easier,” said Sam. “It takes the pressure off them if there are other people to be the centre of attention.”

“That never used to be a problem,” said Steve. “He was always the outgoing one.”

“You’ve known him for a while, then.”

“Basically our entire lives,” Steve agreed. “All of it in Brooklyn. You from around here?”

They ended up getting coffee most times that Steve walked Bucky over. Steve knew Bucky and Sam were still running together, but Bucky didn’t say much to Sam when Steve was there, just went into his meeting and generally came out not wanting to talk much at all.

And usually Steve tried not to talk about Bucky with Sam, although he was right at the front of Steve’s mind when they’d just been walking through Brooklyn together, just like when they were kids and nothing like when they were kids.

“He signed up right out of high school, in ’98,” Steve said. “I tried to too, but they wouldn’t take me. Which was kind of funny, because I was the one who believed in international peacekeeping and all that shit. He just wanted them to pay for college. And his dad was really into it.” Which Steve thought had something to do with why Bucky wasn’t speaking to his parents anymore.

“But he didn’t end up going to college?”

Steve shrugged. “He ended up in a sniper training program. And then 9/11 happened.” When Bucky had first qualified for it he’d been cheerful, casual. And he’d said he was good at it, and seemed proud of that. And then he’d been deployed in Afghanistan, and he’d never talked about sniping again.

Sam nodded. “So, you seen that new Will Smith movie?” It was an obvious change of subject, and Steve was kind of grateful.

 

**August**

Bucky didn’t wear the prosthesis out running, and sometimes not for a while when he came back. These days he usually sprawled out on the couch in his running clothes, drinking the coffee he’d put in the fridge before he left, until he felt like showering. Steve tried to ignore how distracting it was as he grabbed water bottles out of the freezer.

When he had a bag packed he went to the living room and actually took in what he was seeing. “Aren’t you coming?” he asked. They’d need to leave within half an hour if they were getting to Manhattan by ten.

“Where?” Bucky blinked up at him.

“The march, the protest march. Aren’t you coming?”

“No.”

“What? Oh, come on.”

“No.”

“But you’ve been in crowds before, it won’t be that bad, and I’ll be there. Does your arm hurt?”

“It’s got nothing to do with that. I’m fine. I’m just not going.”

“Then why not? This is the Republican Convention, Bucky, we need to make a statement, and we need people like you—for a start, so people realize that not all veterans are fucking Swiftboaters—”

“I’m _not going_ , Steve.”

And Steve couldn’t get him to change his mind. He tried. He said everything he could think of, everything he’d said a million times to other people and hadn’t thought he’d ever have to say to Bucky. None of it worked.

“Bucky, people are dying because of this administration, people are being _tortured_. You _know_ about Abu Ghraib—I mean,” Steve remembered, “maybe not, you were going through a lot then, makes sense if you weren’t paying attention to the news, but—”

“I fucking know about it, okay, Steve? I know, and I would have been able to fucking guess, too, given the shit I saw myself.”

“So why aren’t you _coming_ , then?”

“Because I’m not your dancing monkey, I’m not representing _shit_ , and I’m not fucking _going_.”

Steve felt his eyes widen, and he shut up. Bucky was _glaring_ , leaning forward, braced on the couch and _furious_. Steve wasn’t sure he’d ever seen this expression on Bucky before, definitely not directed at him.

And it wasn’t that he didn’t have comebacks—he could think of a lot of comebacks, would have said them to anyone else, but—

Bucky stood up and disappeared into his room. He slammed the door behind him. Steve stood there with his mouth open for a moment.

Bucky was looking for a job, and had some savings, and still had money coming in from the Army, and in the worst case he could probably patch things up with his parents if he tried. He didn’t have to live with Steve. And the look on his face—

Steve gathered up his stuff and went. He didn’t talk about the protest with Bucky when he got home that evening, and Bucky didn’t ask.

 

**September**

Bucky was still going to group therapy regularly, but he wouldn’t talk about individual therapy. And Steve felt guilty asking, because Bucky had a prosthetist and a physical therapist as well as the group, and between them all he went to at least two appointments every week, but he thought he should anyway.

“Couldn’t you just try it—ask Sam for a recommendation, take one session, see if you like them?”

“No.”

“Bucky, I just think you should talk to someone who isn’t—”

“Fuck it, Steve, I _did_ that already.”

“What?” Steve had no idea what he was talking about, unless it had been in the hospital right afterwards.

Bucky wasn’t looking at him. Finally he said, “They try really hard to keep you, if you’re a sniper.”

Steve said “Mmm?” and tried to look welcoming.

“If there’s something wrong with me, it’s not new. There was—some shit—going on after Afghanistan, way back in 2002. But—” He shook his head.

“What?” Steve asked, after the silence got too long.

“I’m good at it,” Bucky spat out. “I’m really fucking good at killing people, apparently. They want to keep snipers, it’s a limited skillset, they’ll do anything to make sure you stay in. So they fucking threw therapists at me until I could go out again. So much fucking therapy, Christ, and it didn’t change much. I’m not fucking doing that shit again.”

“Oh,” said Steve, but nothing more. He’d think of counterarguments later.

“They wouldn’t discharge me until this happened.” He waved his prosthetic. “Thought I had no skills at all and it turns out I have exactly one.”

“You’ve got other skills,” Steve said.

Bucky huffed out a laugh. “Name one.”

“Science,” said Steve immediately. “You were all about engineering in high school.”

Bucky blinked.

“You were good at it, too,” said Steve. “Better grades than me, anyway.”

“Huh,” said Bucky.

 

**October**

“You going to be handing out candy next week?” Sam asked.

“What?” Steve had barely thought of anything but the election in days. “Oh. No, we live in an apartment, not much point. Too bad,” he added, thoughtfully. “Bucky’s great with kids.”

“Yeah? See if your building’s doing some kind of party for residents.”

“I’ll check for that,” Steve said, thinking about how as far as he knew he and Sam were pretty much Bucky’s entire social circle. Sam glanced at the left wall, behind which was Bucky’s therapy group.

“Still no luck in getting him to one-on-one sessions?”

“Yeah, I’ve kind of been wondering,” said Steve, finally having worked himself up to it but still amazed that he was about to say this at all. “Could you tell me about signs of ... past psychiatric abuse?”

Sam’s eyes widened. “Shit,” he said. “He talked to you about it?”

“No. He just said he had too much therapy in the service, so he’s not doing that again. I was just ... wondering.”

“Huh,” said Sam. “Well, that could obviously be a reason for distrust of therapy, but it doesn’t actually have to be the reason. Because if you have an already traumatized person, forcing them into therapy—or any medical treatment—which they don’t consent to? That’s just more trauma.”

“So it wouldn’t need to have been actually abusive to have made things worse.”

“I’m not diagnosing,” said Sam. “I’m not qualified to, he’s not my patient, I haven’t talked to him about it, this is not a professional opinion. I’m not saying there wasn’t also abuse, either. But yeah. Therapy he didn’t agree to, or where the therapeutic goals conflicted with the patient’s goals, would absolutely have made it worse even if everyone involved thought they were doing the right thing.”

Therapeutic goals, Steve thought. Like getting him back into the field.

“Right. Thanks.” He rubbed his eyes. “So I’m guessing I should quit nagging him about seeing a psychiatrist.”

Sam looked conflicted. “Might be best,” he said.

“Right,” said Steve. “What should I do instead?”

 

**November**

Steve stumbled home at three am on November third. As soon as he opened the door Bucky was in the hallway, holding a knife.

They froze for a moment, and then Bucky relaxed and Steve felt even more like shit for waking him up. He was too drunk to be startled by the weapon.

“We’re losing,” Steve said. “They sent me home. I’m going the fuck to bed.” He should really help Bucky calm down, but. Fuck. So close.

Bucky just nodded. “Drink some water.”

“Fuck the water.” Steve nearly walked into the wall between the hallway and the living room, overcorrected, and made it to the bathroom. Bucky didn’t say anything.

When Steve came out, Bucky was in his room again, door firmly closed. Steve paused in front of it, then went the fuck to bed.

 

**December**

They didn’t do anything for Thanksgiving. Steve was still pissed off about the election, and Bucky’s sister was in Los Angeles, and Bucky wasn’t speaking to his parents, and it didn’t seem worth bothering with it for the two of them. At least, not to Steve, and Bucky hadn’t said anything about it. And Steve was busy, anyway, cleaning out and closing up most of the campaign offices.

Actually, Steve hadn’t stopped being pissed off about the election well into December. So when Sam asked if they were doing anything for Christmas Steve blinked and said, “Honestly, I hadn’t thought about it.”

“Well, I’m seeing family on the day, but I’m having a Christmas party on the Saturday before. You guys should come.”

“I’ll have to see if Bucky’s up to it,” said Steve, “but yeah, that sounds good.”

The clinic had decorations up, and on their way home they walked past a bodega with wreaths and poinsettias outside it, and Bucky actually paused and looked at them. So Steve picked up one of the wreaths, looked at the price tag, and then winced and put it down again.

“Fake ones would be cheaper,” said Bucky.

“Hell, we could get some construction paper and scissors and make them like when we were kids,” said Steve, and Bucky looked at him and laughed.

“Well, if that’s the opinion of professional graphics designer Steve Rogers—”

Well, if that’s what it took to make Bucky laugh...

They stopped at a dollar store a few doors down, and when they got home they used up all the green and red on paper chains and cutout shapes and an impromptu confetti fight. Steve cut snowflakes out of printer paper and taped them to the windows.

“Sam invited us to a Christmas party on the Saturday before it,” Steve said as he started gathering up the unused paper. Bucky grunted and got out the broom. “Do you want to go?”

Steve let Bucky think about it. “You want to go,” Bucky said eventually.

“Yeah. Doesn’t mean we have to, though.”

“Doesn’t mean _I_ have to,” Bucky said.

“Or I could go alone, yeah,” Steve admitted. Bucky sighed.

But they did end up both going, which surprised Steve a little. Bucky had a face like he was making himself do it for his own good, but Steve wasn’t going to call him on it, at least not yet. If they had to leave early that was fine.

And Bucky had made an effort, dressed up in nice jeans and a cableknit sweater, styled his hair, glared at himself in the mirror for ages. Actually, Bucky was paying more attention to his appearance in general these days. Steve had never really paid attention to that kind of thing, but Bucky had when they were teenagers, and now he’d started to again. Now it was leather instead of flannel and his jeans were low-rise, but it still felt the same to Steve on the way to Sam’s place as it had in high school—Bucky looking awesome and Steve looking like a kid borrowing his dad’s clothes. Especially in his winter coat.

Sam’s place was a little crowded but surprisingly quiet, with Motown on in the background and people mostly sitting and talking. Sam came up and got them drinks—nonalcoholic for both of them, though Bucky gave Steve a wry look—and started to show them around, when Bucky suddenly looked at one guy and raised his hand.

“Barnes!” the guy called, waving. “Get over here!”

Bucky glanced at Steve, and then started over, and Steve followed him. Bucky’s friend was blond with amazing biceps, sitting next to a tiny gorgeous redhead who looked like a dancer or a gymnast. Steve tried not to stare too obviously at either of them. “Barton,” said Bucky, once they were in normal conversation distance. “This your girlfriend?”

“Hell no, this is Tasha. You think I’m up to her standards? Tasha, meet James Barnes. And—?”

“Steve Rogers,” said Bucky, and apparently that was enough for the guy to nod knowingly. “Steve, Clint Barton and Natasha Romanov. Clint was on my team for a while.” He added, to Natasha, “I’ve heard a lot about you.”

“And I’ve heard a lot about _you_ ,” Clint said to Steve.

Steve was never sure what to say to people who’d heard about him from Bucky. His usual response was, “I know, you were expecting someone taller.” But Clint didn’t look like he had been, and come to think of it neither had Sam. Maybe Bucky had a better class of friends now, or maybe he was just more honest.

But that left him without a response, so he just said, “None of it true, trust me.”

“All of it’s true,” said Bucky. “You in the States for long, Barton?”

“Permanently,” said Clint, turning his head and pointing to his hearing aid.

“Sucks, man.”

“Eh, not so bad. I’m back to my first love, teaching archery at the Y now. What are you doing?”

“Fucking around waiting for my brain to work right again,” said Bucky. It was more than he usually answered that question with, and to Steve’s surprise he even added, “Might go back to school.”

“Effing A. Army at least paying you for their mistakes?”

“Yeah, but I should probably get a job anyway. Stevie’s an artist, so we’re both broke.”

“Don’t fucking call me Stevie.”

“But broke, that’s fine?”

“Well, we are broke.”

“What kind of art?” asked Natasha, who turned out to be a ballerina with the Met. Steve had spent a few seasons painting sets off Broadway, and they talked about backstage drama while Bucky and Clint commiserated about the VA.

“Steve’s got something to say about that,” said Bucky, giving Steve a sideways smirk, and Steve glanced over. He hadn’t actually heard what Clint had said; he and Bucky were on the wrong side.

“Hmm?”

“Nobody likes Dubya but he still got reelected,” said Clint. “I hear there’s a State of the Union drinking game, we could have a party then.”

“If anyone talks about politics I’m kicking them out,” Sam warned, leaning over the back of the couch. “This is a Christmas party, no one needs that shit.”

“Give us something else to do, then,” said Clint.

“Thanks for volunteering, man! Kitchen.”

“Awww, man,” Clint complained, standing and following Sam.

Natasha laughed and asked Steve about his work, and he asked her about ballet, and Bucky mentioned some of the stories Clint had told him about her, and it all went pretty well. Steve even left Bucky to himself for a while, when Clint came back, and ended up talking to a lesbian couple about police brutality.

When they left Sam’s place Bucky was holding a piece of paper. Steve had noticed some pamphlets on a table, but hadn’t really paid attention—he’d start looking for more political work in January. He couldn’t see which one Bucky’d grabbed.

He wanted to ask. But he remembered the RNC fight, and decided that he wouldn’t push. And he didn’t have to wait too long to find out the basics; when they got home Bucky tossed it on the coffee table and went off to the bathroom.

_Iraq Veterans Against the War._

Steve made sure Bucky saw him looking at it when he came back, but Bucky just grabbed a banana from the kitchen and said goodnight as he headed off to his room.

So Steve didn’t mention it, and didn’t clear it away when it stayed there for weeks. It moved a couple times, though, so, he hoped, Bucky had read it. Maybe more than once. Maybe he was thinking about it.

It might still make things worse. Steve didn’t know. But it was something, something Bucky’d picked up on his own, something he was interested in without Steve prompting it, and Steve’s chest felt tight and warm whenever he thought about it.

 

**January**

Bucky hadn’t cut his hair since he moved in. By New Year’s it was almost chin length, and Steve suspected he was using it to hide behind. But it wasn’t a mess—he washed it, sometimes he styled it, and if it made him feel safe enough to leave the apartment more often, Steve was all for it.

Also, it made him look unbelievably sexy, but Steve wasn’t going to mention that.

January came, and with it the post-Christmas art sales drop. Steve got a part-time job with the Housing Authority which was only a little soul-destroying. Bucky started spending a lot of time at the VA, which Steve took as a good sign.

Steve couldn’t get to DC for the counter-inaugural protest, but he did go to Times Square. Bucky stopped him on his way to the door, and Steve tensed up.

“Hey,” Bucky said, “good luck. Don’t do anything stupid.”

“How can I?” Steve asked, relaxing, and Bucky laughed and punched his arm before he could finish the joke.

*

The next day he called Peggy, who had been at the DC protest. He paced around the living room as they both complained about politics. She had a little more information than him about what was going on, but it wasn’t encouraging.

“Okay, Steve, you’ve been on the phone for an hour,” said Bucky, coming out of his room. “Hang up on your girlfriend, I need to call the damn benefits people before they close.”

“Oh, sorry,” said Steve, and explained it to Peggy, and hung up. He paused holding the phone for a second, though. “She’s not my girlfriend,” he told Bucky. Bucky rolled his eyes.

“I know she’s not, you’re gay.”

“Uh, no. I mean. Bi.” Bucky stared at him. “Um. She was my girlfriend. For a while, while you were away, before she moved for work.”

“You were dating her?” Bucky was still staring. Steve shifted uncomfortably.

“Look, it’s not that weird. I would have told you, but right after she moved to DC, um—” He waved at Bucky’s arm, and Bucky rolled his eyes. “I was kind of preoccupied.”

“Yeah, okay. Well. Good, now I feel like less of a dick for trying to set you up with girls in high school.”

Steve snorted.

Bucky looked out the window. “There was a guy. Who I, um. Met.”

Steve tried to think of something to say, and ended up with, “Oh?”

“In the hospital, after. Another amp. Nothing happened. But.”

“Oh,” said Steve. He should be supportive, or something, like Bucky had been when Steve had come out to him when they were fifteen. But he wasn’t sure how to do that now, and Bucky wasn’t acting like he wanted a huge production made of it.

“So, uh. Me too.”

“Great! Let’s cover the balcony in rainbow flags.”

Bucky grinned and shook his head, and Steve relaxed. “Give me the phone,” Bucky said, and Steve tossed it to him.

 

**February**

Steve couldn’t forget that conversation. He didn’t know what had gone on, in the hospital, for Bucky to realize he was—and he didn’t know what Bucky thought about it, except that it was important enough, and Steve was important enough, for him to tell Steve. That should be enough—Steve should not be wondering who, or why, or why not him. But he found himself poking at the idea like a loose tooth, when entering data at work, on the subway, when he was drawing and found himself singing along to his battered Walkman, “I’ve got no criteria for sex or race, I just wanna hear your voice, I just wanna see your face.”

It was very clear _whose_ face, these days. It was almost like being in high school again.

He’d gotten over it in college, he’d thought. He’d certainly dated enough people other than Bucky. And maybe he really had been over it, until suddenly it looked like he might have a chance. Even though he knew it didn’t necessarily mean anything, that just because someone was interested in men didn’t mean they were interested in him—he should know that very well, by now. But he wanted it to mean something, with Bucky. He wanted Bucky to look at him the way Steve had always looked back.

But he should either ask Bucky or try to forget it again. Which he guessed depended on whether Bucky was at all ready for a relationship.

And since Steve had no way of figuring that out, he tried to leave it alone.

For a couple of months Steve had thought Bucky was much better. Bucky still slept with a baseball bat next to his bed, and had a lot of knives hidden around his room, and if he had anything other than knives Steve didn’t want to know about it, but Steve hadn’t seen him actually holding any of the weapons since November. He’d gone out, he’d talked to people, he’d even gone to the Christmas party.

And then he’d started shutting down again. Not as much as last summer, maybe, but Steve kept coming home to find Bucky staring into space, or sometimes at the TV, pressing his hook against his right arm. “Is the prosthesis giving you trouble?” he asked once, and Bucky shook his head, looking irritated, so Steve left it at that and went to work on a commission.

It was hard to know what he could get away with, what wouldn’t make Bucky shove him away, embarrassed. But the next time he came back from work to find Bucky absently pulling at the hook he went over and sat next to him and put a hand on his shoulder, and that seemed to be all right. Bucky didn’t move away, anyway.

“You didn’t seem interested in therapy last summer, has that changed?”

“Fuck no. I’m _fine_. I’m sitting on my ass while people get blown up, don’t worry about me.” Steve looked up, found the remote, and turned CNN off.

“You can say you’re miserable. You can be miserable, that’s fine.”

“I’m not,” Bucky said bitterly.

“Then what?” Steve asked, trying not to sound disbelieving. Bucky shook his head and leaned back against the couch. Steve kept his hand on Bucky and waited.

“I’m fucking _glad_ ,” Bucky finally said to the ceiling, full of self-hatred. “I’m _glad_ I lost my arm, because it got me out of that fucking hellhole—”

Without thinking Steve wrapped his arms around Bucky, held him as close as he could, and if Bucky didn’t lean into it he didn’t pull away either.

“—because I’m a disgusting—”

“No, you’re not.” Steve couldn’t actually hold Bucky any tighter, but he tried, and Bucky’s head dropped to his shoulder. “No, you’re not.” He thought desperately as Bucky stayed tense in his arms. “Look, the other vets at the centre, the ones with all their limbs attached—should they be trying to get back in? Should everyone be lining up to join, or to join up again? Should _I_?”

“It’s different.”

“No, it’s not.”

“Steve, you don’t know—”

“Look,” said Steve, cutting Bucky off because if he was going to say anything about Steve not being a soldier Steve would have to yell at him and this wouldn’t go anywhere good. “Look, do you think what they’re doing in Iraq is _right_? Is useful, or moral, or _right_ —seriously,” he said, trying to calm down a bit. “Do you? I’m not going to argue with you, either way, not right now.”

“Sure you’re not,” said Bucky, looking away.

“Not right now. Do you?”

Bucky kept looking away, and Steve slowly reached up, making sure Bucky could see that he was moving, and gently turned Bucky’s face toward him. He waited. Bucky looked down, jaw moving a little. Steve kept waiting.

“No,” Bucky whispered.

“Then you don’t owe them anything,” Steve said, and he meant to say it firmly but it came out in a whisper too. “You can be glad, that you’re out of it. You’re allowed to be glad to stop doing something you think is wrong. You’re allowed to be glad that you’re not killing anyone anymore.”

Bucky pressed his face against Steve’s shoulder, shaking. Steve held on to him.

 

**March**

In the end, it was easy.

Bucky was reading on the couch when Steve came in from work. The light was golden as sunset approached, and it laid the lines of the fire escape across the floor.

Steve had kind of planned on doing something else, at least starting dinner, but instead he was drawn to sit next to Bucky, grabbing his sketchbook from the coffee table as he sat. Steve drew the patterns of light and shadow on the floor as they moved with the sun, but he knew what he really wanted to draw, and at last he sketched in Bucky’s profile against the window as he’d seen it coming in. He flipped to the next page and started drawing Bucky properly.

He glanced up at Bucky, not that he really needed to to draw him, and instead of the profile he was expecting he caught Bucky glancing at him. Bucky’s eyes dropped back to his book at once, and then he looked up again and smiled and said, “What are you drawing?”

And Steve let go of his sketchbook and pencil and shifted, because suddenly he’d skipped right past hope and into confidence. He leaned over to Bucky, trying not to go too fast, but his hands found Bucky’s jaw and he saw Bucky’s mouth open and then he was kissing him, finally.

“Steve,” Bucky whispered as Steve pulled away, but then he leaned right back in and kissed Steve back. This time it lasted longer, and it was ... really really good, and Steve realized that actually his position was kind of precarious and he was almost falling into Bucky’s lap, which was a problem, but he could ignore it.

“Steve. Holy shit, Steve.” Bucky twisted so he could put his hand on Steve’s shoulder, and Steve took the hint and pulled back a bit, settling closer to Bucky but not on top of him. He wanted to say something, something casual and confident that would explain everything, or somehow ask if Bucky knew what he meant without him having to actually say what he meant, but he couldn’t think of anything.

“So, uh, yeah?” he said, which was not it.

“Yeah,” said Bucky. “If you want, yeah.”

“Of course I want.”

“Of course,” Bucky muttered, and kissed him again. “Well, if you say so.”

“Bucky—”

“No, I—” Bucky shook his head. “C’mere, Steve.”

Just before they actually kissed, Steve managed to say, “I’ve wanted this for a long time,” and if it wasn’t smooth at least it was what he meant. Bucky paused, so close to Steve he could feel his breath. “Really,” Steve added.

Bucky pulled away a little, and Steve opened his eyes, ready to pull him back. But Bucky just nodded, and pulled Steve into another kiss.

*

“Hey, can I check something on your computer?” Bucky asked, and Steve shoved his fucking tax paperwork to the side and nodded.

“Sure, I need a break. You want some coffee?”

“Sure.”

When Steve came back with the coffee he glanced over Bucky’s shoulder automatically. “City Tech?” he asked, and then realized that maybe he shouldn’t.

“Yeah,” said Bucky, not seeming offended. “I, uh, applied in January, going to see if there’s an update.”

“That’s great!”

Bucky shrugged. “I joined up to pay for it, after all, might as well actually make them do it.”


End file.
